nine2five 15 The Real Me
by Marc Vun Kannon
Summary: Once upon a time, Chuck and Sarah got married. How did that happen? I'm going to aim for Charah fun in this one. The first page is about as serious (i.e., weird) as it's going to get, but after that I'm exercising my banter muscles.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N** The trainyard is a representation of Chuck's own mind, as perceived from the inside. I hope that didn't need to be said.

* * *

_"__I'm so glad you're here." _

"_Didn't want you to be alone."_

"_That degree of irony would probably make the universe implode."_

_"__Lucky for you I don't mind long sleeves.__"_

* * *

He sat on a bench in the train station, watching the yard. He liked watching the trains, not really wondering where they were going but aware that they were going somewhere, not interested in what they carried but he knew they carried something. It was the coming and going that pleased him, the constant motion, and all that it revealed. The yard appeared to be such chaos on top, but there was such order below, patterns. He liked patterns, liked finding them.

So many trains in motion, so many not. Tracks buried, unused, unknowable. He hated the idle trains for not showing him what was under them or where they went. But trains follow tracks and tracks follow… what did tracks follow? What was the pattern of the world beyond the trainyard, the world that patterned the tracks? Only the tracks could tell him that, and only the trains could tell him about the tracks.

He had to know.

He followed them as they left, felt them as they went wherever they were able to go.

* * *

The patterns changed. They both noticed.

"Is he coming out of it?" asked her assistant, fooled by the activity. There was always activity.

It had only increased, not changed bands, and she settled back to watch. "Not yet."

"Then what's all this?" He pointed to the suddenly busy wave.

Just an alpha. "He's dreaming." She sent a text to the group.

* * *

He saw things, in the trainyard. Some of them stayed, and danced for him. Most of them flickered in and out of sight, never there when he looked at them but teasing at the edges. Once he heard footsteps, and he knew fear, so he looked, knowing that what he feared would not be there when he looked.

"Please, Chuck, please come with me." He turned, and saw a woman, beautiful but ugly with fear, standing there talking to him, pleading with him. He guessed he was Chuck, it felt right. "We have to go away, we have to run away." She pointed to a train, battered and beaten. He didn't know where it went, it was one of the ones he hated.

_I'm not going with you._

She came up to take him by the arm, but she couldn't touch him, couldn't move him. She was just a figment, a part of a life he might once have chosen. The trains doors opened and pulled her in, but he sat where he was, unmoved. The train closed its doors and left, and he tried to know where it went but wherever that was he couldn't follow. Where do figments go when no one imagines them?

Another train went by, slow and sedate. He turned to look at it. She was there again, in the window, hair glowing gold and blue eyes bright with happiness. Still beautiful but no longer afraid, she smiled at him as the train took her away and the sight moved him as no others had. Chuck stood. He had to follow, he wanted to follow, but the train was already going and the woman of his dreams was going with it.

He felt something, a shift in the air rather than the ground, a train that moved so fast it almost flew. He leapt on a box, jumped up and caught the edge of the roof, flipping his weightless self up on top of the roof as the train bore down without stopping. He ran as the train came in, he reached the end of the platform as the train went out and he jumped onto the roof of the last car. Fast as a bullet the train carried him along, faster than the other train, the train with the woman on it.

He had to find her, he had to be with her.

He saw her train up ahead and knew hope. He saw the path of the train he was on and knew despair. He had to hurry. The train he was on moved fast but the tunnel her train was going into was coming up faster. He leapt from car to car, train to train, desperate to find a hatch, any way to get inside before— That tunnel sure was taking its time getting here.

Was it his imagination or was this train getting longer?

Suddenly aware it had been noticed, the tunnel mouth leapt forward, swallowing the car voraciously.

_Crap._ The rear of the train was too far, the tunnel roof too low. He raced to the edge and did a handspring, holding on the flanges at the edge as–

Time slowed down and he hung upside-down in the still air. The fast train was moving, the only thing that was, and he looked over to it. With the clarity of dreams he saw a window and a man standing behind it, tall, curly-haired, brown-eyed. His face frozen in an expression of cold and furious resolve as their separate trains took them away from each other–

The air moved, the train moved, his body moved, completing its arc to hang against the side.

Somewhere down around chest level the window he was up against opened. Two strong arms wrapped around his waist and pulled him into the car as the train entered the darkness.

* * *

Manoosh knew he had the best job and the best boss in the whole world. She didn't care what he did, as long as he had what she needed when she needed it. Did she care that he stole sodas from the machine? No, she just fixed it so it was harder to do the next time. She didn't care if he read webcomics while waiting for his code to compile. She understood him, she grokked his essence. She was…awesome, scary awesome.

He would do anything for her, like modify her father's brain scanner to note changes in activity, as well as the activity itself. And then he added an alert to the new sensor. When it became quite clear to him how concerned she was for the Host, he added an alarm to the alert.

Which he could only barely hear over the sound of music in his earphones as he watched youtube videos while reading his webcomics and drinking stolen soda while waiting for his code to compile. The downside to multitasking.

He kicked his chair over to the machine and verified the readings. Betas were kicking up, alphas going down, the other two were the same as always. "Boss, he's surfacing!"

He got up and locked the door, so he couldn't accidentally go out where he might see the Host as she moved him out of the Intersect room. Then he went back to his desk and turned off the music and shut down the comic, now that his code was done. She'd need something from him, he was sure.

Somewhere in the midst of all these preparations he managed to lose the mildly annoying awareness that something was wrong. The perils of multitasking.

* * *

Chuck found himself lying in bed, so comfortable, the rhythmic thump of the train beneath him soothing and soporific. Or it would have been, if he hadn't been in bed with the most wonderful woman in the world, which gave rhythmic bumping and thumping a whole different meaning. He reached out.

"Be careful with the hands, Chuck," said his big sister's voice. His world shook with a loud accompanying _thump!_

"Aahh!" Chuck sat bolt upright, yelling into Ellie's face, but she simply pushed him back down again firmly. "Aah-ow!" A line of fire ran down the length of his back.

"And stay there until I get this thing locked down," she added, pushing the gurney through the doors to the recovery room. "You've had enough comas for a while, I don't want you falling out of bed and putting yourself into another."

"Where's Sarah?" he asked, eyes flicking side-to-side frantically but too terrified of his sister to move. "We were on a bed, on a train, and it was just going into a tunnel–"

She turned bright red. "I don't want to hear the rest of _that_ dream."

He gave her an exasperated look. "Sometimes a tunnel is just a tunnel, sis."

"Or," she said, turning red again, "The tunnel was simply a symbol of transition, as you were becoming conscious and leaving the dream state." She pushed the gurney into its slot and set the brakes.

"_Or…_it was just a train."

She rolled her eyes. "Fine, it was just a train." She bustled about, reattaching all the little connections to all the little sticky pads, so her devices could tell her what her heart already knew. "How are you feeling, little brother?"

"Confused," he admitted. "Didn't I just leave here?"

"Only if your definition of 'just' means 'two days ago'," said Ellie. She got him another blanket, just to have something to do.

He recognized her need to fuss over him, and let her. "How did I lose two days? Did Carmichael get loose again?" He tried to remember two days ago, but all that came to mind was the trace-cell mission itself. Last night was popcorn and hot cocoa night, but if that really _was_ two days ago, no wonder he was starving.

"Not exactly. I'll let Carina explain it to you, when they get here. Do you still remember the men with the gun, about to shoot you?"

Guns and needles combined, not likely to forget that. "Yes, and I remember waking up in the Intersect room."

"Very good. Anything else?"

"I remember the last time I ate. I don't suppose your assistant has any Geek Cuisine available?"

Now _that_ took her back, but not in a good way. "Hot Pockets and Red Bull? I'll ask."

* * *

He was careful not to talk with his mouth full. "What?"

What 'what'? She was just sitting there. With a ridiculous grin on her face. "Aren't I allowed to be happy that my brother is out of his coma?"

He licked the grease off his fingers slowly. "You're staring at me."

"I'm enjoying watching you eat," she said, handing him a towel. All sorts of brain problems affect the appetite for the worse.

"And that's what's creepy about it." He wiped everything, including his face, twice. "You hate it when I eat this stuff. Whatever happened to my big doctor sister who was always nagging me to eat better?"

She couldn't scowl and grin at the same time. "I was not always nagging!"

"You put nutritional pie charts all over the kitchen."

_Grrr. _"Because I didn't want to nag you."

"Well, it didn't work." He tossed the towel at the 'soiled laundry' bin and missed. "All you did was give me a severe case of pie-chart-a-phobia. Probably why I went to work at the Buy More, no pie charts anywhere."

She settled back into her chair. "And would you believe that I was _grateful_, that you went to work at the Buy More? That first month after you came home from Stanford, all night gaming binges with nothing but this awful stuff to eat. I thought you were getting some sense of purpose back."

The curse of his perfect memory, he could remember those days just fine. He frowned at the blanket covering his toes. "Nah. Just trying to help Morgan out."

"I figured that out after the first year. You were there to help him out, and he was there to keep you company."

"He was developing his work-avoidance skills at the time. Not much of a career track in that."

_Is he that stupid?_ "He was being your wingman while you were in a power dive!"

"I know, sis. I was being selfi—wait a minute, are you saying he was faking it?"

_Okay, not stupid, just thoughtless._ "Look at him. You're on cruise control, so is he. You move on, so does he. You got a girl, so did he, and then when you married her–"

"Wow. And here I thought you hated him."

"Oh, I did. For years, believe me, I did. I used to like Peter Cetera but Morgan just–" She clutched her fingers in her hair, then slowly let go. "But he's a great follower. He wouldn't let you lead him where he didn't want to go."

* * *

"Chuck?" Sarah's voice preceded here into the room but not by much.

Chuck put on a feeble, thin voice, raising a hand. "The thin, pale remnants of him, wife."

"Oh, well, then I guess I brought you this just in time." She put a foil take-out container on the tray-table.

"Is this a dinner I see before me, it's handle to my hand?"

Sarah drew back. "What?"

"Macbeth," said Chuck, bending back the edges. "One of the deleted scenes, I'm pretty sure. I'll check the DVD when we get home." He pried off the lid. "Oh look, salad."

Sarah pinned him with a look. "You need to eat better. Ellie says." She was really good at following orders, when she wanted to follow them.

"I love salad," he shouted.

She held out a plastic fork. "Good. And if you're a real good boy and eat all of that, I'll let you have the gooey burger-y thing all dripping with cheese and bacon that I left at Ellie's desk."

Chuck's smile was as plastic as the fork. "You're gonna watch me, aren't you?"

She stepped back. "I'm sorry. I'd love to, but…I'm not alone."

"You sure look alone to me."

"I'm not, but she's afraid." Sarah started to back away.

"Afraid? Afraid of what, me?" He held up the foil container. "I have this, I won't eat her."

"Just be gentle." Sarah left the room.

A second later, Carina was physically shoved inside. She waved at him. "Hi, Chuck."

* * *

**A/N2 **'Be Gentle'?How long has it been since anyone said that about Carina? Hopeful for comments below.**  
**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N **Maximum Charah, with a few plot elements thrown in for good measure.**  
**

* * *

_"He's dreaming__." _

"_Careful with the hands, Chuck__."_

"_How did I lose two days?__"_

_"Hi, Chuck__.__"_

* * *

_Be gentle, she says._ This about a woman who'd promised on three separate occasions to eat him alive. "Hi, uh, Carina. So you're handling my briefing?" Hadn't Ellie said something like that?

She smiled a little, winced a lot, and said, "No, I'm just here to tell you what happened yesterday."

She didn't call him 'Chuckles'. She didn't leap on the straight line. She looked like she was…dithering. "All right, who are you, really?"

She ran her fingers through her hair. It didn't look _that_ bad, did it? "Chuck?"

"No, _I'm _Chuck. You, on the other hand, appear to be some outer space alien doing a poor Carina Miller impression." He pointed his finger at her. "You kidnapped her, didn't you? You kidnapped my friend and took her to your mother ship to do all sorts of probing under anesthesia, which, let me tell you, is a waste of good anesthesia–"

"Chuck, please."

He shut up. Maybe that last bit was a bit over the top…He stuck a piece of lettuce in his mouth.

"Did you just call me your friend?"

Did lettuce even qualify as food? "Well, yeah. You're Sarah's friend, therefore you're my friend." He scraped through the foliage in the tray. _Maybe if I try a bunch at once…_

She watched him chew in silence. "Do you really think it's that simple? Some sort of…cumulative principle of friendship?"

He chuckled. "Commutative," he corrected, and she cursed. "A commutative principle. Only in this case it's transitive, not commutative. And why not, it usually works."

"Says the guy who used to work in a Buy More." Probably the only one who did.

"I said usually, not always. Of course, now that I think about it, an enemy of an enemy is also a friend, so the math may be more–"

"You must live a charmed life."

He looked at the door. "Not until recently, no."

She looked too, as if either of them could see Sarah out there, and hung her head. "Sorry. Put my foot in it again." She raised her head to look at him, cleared her throat. "I…haven't a good friend to you lately."

"So I gathered."

_Who told? _ "From what?"

"My sister. You've met her, the towering colossus of medicine outside. Let me tell you, she's got a bedside manner to match. It's a good thing her patients are usually unconscious, although I can't tell if that's a cause or an effect…"

Outside, something made a loud noise.

"Keep it down out there," Chuck yelled, "We're talking! Where was I? Oh, right, so when she passed the buck on the way in this afternoon, I figured it had to be something big, something pretty bad, and you were at the center of it."

Carina pointed to the door. "You realize she can probably hear you?"

"I hope so, kind of a waste of good material if she can't. You don't suppose they put 'stand-up comic' in with the rest of the skill sets–?"

"Chuck! Can you be serious for one damned second! I betrayed you to the Ring two nights ago and it's _not funny!_"

Chuck scraped the last of the salad out of the tray, watching her as she stared at him, panting. "No," he finally said, dropping the tray on the table with a clatter. "It's not funny, and I'm glad you feel that way. But admitting it was a lot easier than you were thinking it would be five minutes ago, wasn't it?"

* * *

Sarah lifted her head from the speaker they were eavesdropping through. "Wow, that was good!" That was her Chuck, the one she liked to hear, over the speaker or any other way she could. _Say anything._

Ellie turned the sound down. They weren't saying anything she didn't already know. "He actually got Jeff and Lester at the Buy More to do some work. Now you know how."

Sarah pulled on her shirt, her clothes suddenly tight. "Is it me or is it hot in here?" She looked around at the walls of the Intersect room. "Doesn't this place have any A/C?"

Ellie laughed. "Uh-huh. And a treadmill, and a stairmaster. None of which are the cure for what ails _you. _Don't worry, I'll let you take him home just as soon as he's done." She took a sip of her water.

Sarah squirmed in her chair. "Wouldn't want to argue with a towering colossus." The timing was perfect, water everywhere.

Ellie was too busy choking to notice the flashing light, indicating someone trying to call her. Fortunately Sarah was there to answer the call for her.

"Hello, El-what's the matter?" asked General Beckman.

"Nothing, General," said Sarah brightly, as Ellie fumbled. "Just a little water down the wrong pipe."

Beckman looked over their shoulders. "What are you two doing in the Intersect room? I wasn't aware of any repairs scheduled for today."

"Nothing like that, General," answered Sarah, rubbing Ellie's back. "We're being craven. Carina's in there telling Chuck what happened, and _somebody–_" She patted Ellie a little harder than was strictly necessary "–got the brilliant idea to listen in."

Beckman frowned at the both of them. "There's a speaker in her office."

"Yes, there is. That's why we're being craven now. It seems _somebody_ might not be as suited for stakeout duty as they thought."

"Erm," rasped Ellie, giving Sarah a dirty look. Beckman's mouth twitched. "What can I do for you, General?"

"You mentioned the other day that you would be going over recent events with an eye toward any Carmichael involvement. I'm calling for an update on that search."

Ellie had to think about it a bit before she recollected foolishly making that comment in front of a superior. Of course said superior took a vague idea and turned it into a task for her, one she hadn't followed up on. "Nothing to report yet, General, recent events being what they were. I'll have Manoosh gather up the relevant cases for analysis."

"Are you sure that's wise, Ellie? We've kept him from seeing Chuck all this time."

"I don't think there should be too much trouble, General. Many of our conversations about Carmichael didn't have Chuck present, for obvious reasons, and for the events where Carmichael was present I'll give him access to Chuck's own recordings, where Chuck himself doesn't appear. And besides, you promised to put him on salary, which means he'd have to take all sorts of oaths."

Sarah tuned them out. Of all the voices in the room, she knew which one she wanted to hear the most, and bent her head to the speaker.

* * *

"You're not mad?" asked Carina.

"Do you want me to be? 'Cause to tell you the truth, Carina…I just don't feel it. I believe you and everything you said about what you did, but…I wasn't there. I'd be willing to be mad at you on Sarah's behalf – you did almost leave her husbandless – but she's probably got that covered and would hurt me if I tried to steal her thunder."

_What the hell? _"So you're just gonna leave me hanging? Everybody else was willing to beat me up, why aren't you?"

"Because if what you say is true, then I'm just as much to blame in this as you are. I knew how us getting together would bother Morgan, but it never occurred to me to wonder what it would do to you. I'm sorry I was so thoughtless."

Carina looked for the nearest wall.

* * *

Sarah sat up suddenly. "Um, excuse me. I've got to go somewhere," she mumbled, pushing herself away from the table.

Ellie and Beckman watched as Sarah didn't quite run to the door and let herself out.

"What was that?" asked the General. "Is there a problem?"

"Shouldn't be, there's a bathroom in the corner. Something she heard, maybe?" Ellie turned up the volume.

The sound of rhythmic pounding. _"You're killing me here, Chuck…Oh, I get it!"_ The pounding stopped.

"_You're killing me with kindness, aren't you? Torturing me by not torturing me! That's a lot nastier than I ever would have expected from you, Chuckles."_

"_Uh…you're welcome?"_ The sound of a door opening. _"Oh thank God, Sarah! Carina and I were just talking about what—Sarah, what are you doing?" _The sound of bedsprings, or in this case gurneysprings, creaking. _"Watch the hands! Cold! Cold hands! Ow, you're pulling on the–"_ The sound one or more machines shrieking electronically. _"Well, that's one way to—are you quite comfy now?"_

The sound of aggressive snuggling. _"Mm-hmm."_

Ellie turned the sound down again. "Now you see why we were hiding in here?"

"Turn it up," ordered the General.

* * *

Sarah lifted her head. "Oh. Carina. You're still here." The hands weren't as cold as that tone.

Carina grinned. No way Sarah would get out of there to kick her out or anything else. "You bet, Blondie. I wasn't done, uh, _briefing_ your husband, but it looks like you're ready to begin the debriefing any time now."

A soft sigh and a whisper as Sarah deflated. "Boxers."

Chuck turned red.

Carina didn't. "And that is really more than I needed to know."

* * *

"What?" said Beckman, "What's more than she needed to know?"

"I don't know, General, I couldn't make it out either." She upped the volume.

* * *

Carina forced her eyes to look at something else. "Casey was right, it's like reality bends around you. I'm getting out of here before I get sucked into your–" Two _thunks!_ sounded as one, and only the fact that they were on either side of her head enabled Carina to tell them apart. She couldn't move her head far enough to either side to see them, but she could feel the handles of Sarah's knives poke her cheeks when she tried. "Geez! I'm going already, Mrs. Bunny Rabbit." She left the knives where they were and left the room.

The outer office reeked of bacon. The only food she'd had since last night's Chinese was this afternoon's French fries. She moved toward the bag.

Sarah would kill her if she stole her husband's lunch. She took a step away from the bag.

There she stayed, trapped in her own evil orbit of loser-dom around a sandwich, when she heard Sarah's voice. Not through the door but from the speaker on the desk.

"_I thought she'd never leave."_

"_Not to sound complaining here, but you couldn't have snagged the cheeseburger on the way in?"_

Carina rolled her eyes, and picked up the bag. Once through the door, she stopped and pulled the two knives from the wall before going to the bed. "Here."

"Thank you, bless you, thank you." Chuck didn't wait for her to leave, and she couldn't stop watching as he tore into her–_his_–lunch. "Did Casey really say that reality bends around me?" It didn't sound like something the big man would say.

"No, he just said you gave her a larger pond to swim in–" _nitwit _"–where words like 'ninja' and 'cuddle' can be used in the same sentence." She watched as Sarah snaked her arm out from under the blankets and took back her two knives, without looking to see where they were. "General Beckman made a smart decision, letting you two stay married."

* * *

"She'd have gutted me like a trout if I hadn't," said Beckman calmly. "And then taken Chuck off to God knows where. Don't look so shocked, Ellie, you know it's true. That landslide was inevitable. The trick isn't to stop a thing like that, but to make it happen at a time and place of your choosing."

"Preferably with your enemies under it?"

Beckman sighed. "Are you sure I can't talk you into taking the colors, Ellie? You really do have a command mentality."

* * *

"I suppose that's one of the things they teach you in General School," said Chuck, trying to avoid dripping ketchup in his wife's hair.

Carina mustered her courage. "I should be going." She could get her own lunch on the way home.

"Yes, you should," said Sarah. "Then Ellie can come back in and we can get this ball rolling."

Chuck and Carina both started coughing.

Sarah looked up. "You know what I meant!" She elbowed herself up and kissed her husband, ketchup and all. "I can't wait to get you home, Mr. Bartowski."

Suddenly Chuck's heart monitor started beeping wildly.

Sarah looked around wildly. "What's the matter?"

"Don't even joke about things like that!" said Chuck. "It's like saying 'just one last mission, Chuck'. We all know how well those turn out, don't we? Do you remember what happened the last time you said that?"

"' I can't wait to get you home, Mr. Bartowski'?" Sarah repeated. "No idea. I would hope something good. What happened?"

"Yeah, Chuck," said Carina, "What happened?"

Chuck's head fell back to the pillow weakly, and Carina snagged the sandwich before it hit the covers.

"We got married," he groaned.

* * *

**A/N2 **Do tell.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N** A good dose of backstory. If they're in a car it's a flashback.

* * *

_"You must live a charmed life." _

_"I just don't feel it."_

_"__It's like reality bends around you."_

_"We got married." _

* * *

Carina shook her head, amazed. "Chuck, what were you thinking?"

He opened his eyes, utterly serene. "What do you mean?"

"Your wife, the woman you married, is in bed with you."

"Yes, thank God." The shape that was Sarah moved under the blankets.

Carina watched the hands. "I just gave her her two knives back."

"I know. A daring and gutsy move, I might add."

"Not as gutsy as talking about your marriage that way when she's lying next to you with two knives in her hands." She took a bite of his sandwich.

Chuck smiled at her. "The only thing more wonderful than my marriage is the woman I married," he said, "And I've devoted my life to making sure she knows that every day. And she does." Suddenly Chuck looked concerned. "At least, I think she does." He looked down. "Do you know that?"

A feminine giggle, a deep breath, and a soft 'mm-hmm' drifted up from somewhere down by his chest.

He stroked her back. "My woman of action. Not so big on the words." Chuck looked back up at Carina again. "But she'll be the first to admit that the circumstances surrounding our union were…less than ideal."

Sarah started to laugh.

"You see?"

Carina saw. "She did say something way back when about you stupidly doing the right thing."

Chuck said nothing, his eyes glazing over, and she wondered what he was looking at. No, she _knew_ what he was looking at, and wondered what it was. Sarah raised her head again in his silence and stillness, a look of concern on her face.

His grip on her shoulder tightened, and he looked down at her. "I don't know if it was stupid or right. But it was _my_ thing, _my_ choice, one of the few that I've ever had in my life, and I wasn't about to waste it."

"You were free," said Sarah. "You were safe…"

He raised a hand to stroke her cheek. "Like I could ever be free or safe when you were neither. You had to help Bryce, and I had to help you."

"Now _that_ I can believe," said Carina. "No way even you would help the man who stole your two best girls, three times over."

"Bryce did none of the things we thought he did," said Sarah to both of them but still looking at him. "We spoke to Orion when you were gone."

"The two of them were in it together, huh?" Chuck's face hardened. "I had fewer choices than I thought."

She moved in for the kiss. "You made the right one when it counted."

"With what alternative?" asked Carina. "Oh that's right, all of you dead. Some choice."

Sarah gave Carina a dirty look. "I think he's a hero. Only the skills saved us and he didn't know about them when he did it. What he _did_ know–"

"Was that Beckman would have him locked down the second she heard about it, if he lived. Same old same old. I'm surprised you didn't just run."

* * *

Run. Run away, taking her brother with her, leaving her alone. Ellie looked at Beckman. "Would she have?"

"That sort of thing takes planning," said the General. "Sarah would have known this. She wouldn't have run now, but she might have tried later. I'm glad it never came to that."

* * *

Sarah said nothing, her eyes moving, her gaze sweeping the room, and Chuck knew. Actions, not words. "The thought occurred to us, in a moment of traitorous, disloyal panic," he said. "But fortunately we had an alternative, and wiser heads prevailed. Orion gave me his wrist computer before we left. He has a lot of experience staying out of the CIA's hands. We sought out his wise and sage counsel."

"Which was?"

"Run," said Sarah.

Carina huffed out a laugh. "That's helpful."

"To Las Vegas and get married."

"And Casey let you?"

"We didn't tell him, of course," said Chuck. "That would have been a terrible dilemma to put him in, after all he'd done for us. He told Sarah to take me off grid, just in case, since he had to stay and deal with the Ring agents we'd just captured. By the time he'd gotten them carted off, the site secured, the official reports written, a late night snack–"

"He likes pancakes," put in Sarah, as a bit of corroborative detail, "But there aren't that many late-night pancake places in Burbank."

"–his teeth brushed–"

"Because you know that syrup is terrible for the teeth if you leave it on too long."

"–and his weapons cleaned and properly racked, well, by then it was just early enough in DC that he could think about maybe catching the General in her office. He knew that for a CF of this magnitude she would want a face-to-face report. I don't think he had to wait more than half an hour to make that call."

* * *

"Colonel Casey always did his duty," said Beckman. "Although he could be more…creative in the way he went about it than I might sometimes have wished."

"Was this one of those times?"

"Not at all. He was just positioning himself so that I could make the landslide fall on him if I needed it to. He was always so worried about whether Sarah was compromised that he never looked into his own mirror until they forced him to."

* * *

"So basically you're saying Casey ratted you out, the bastard," said Carina, smiling.

"Come on, Carina, it was his duty," said Chuck, smiling back.

"All right, I'll forgive him," said Carina magnanimously, "But just this once and only because you say so. So how'd you get to Nevada before your first check-in? That's got to be some pretty fast driving, even for you."

Chuck looked at Sarah. "Um–"

Sarah looked at Chuck. "Well–"

* * *

Ellie moved her hand.

"Doctor Woodcombe, , if you touch that dial I swear I will have you drafted, just so I can court-martial you. I've been wondering about this for months. Stand down!"

* * *

The bright red Porsche screamed through the desert night. Actually, it wasn't the car screaming so much as the passenger.

"Sarah! Are we on the ground yet?"

She laughed, so, so happy. Speed, love, and unity of purpose. She'd never felt so complete in her life. "We never left it, silly."

"It sure felt that way." He opened his eyes, not that it made a bit of difference.

"At these speeds a worm cast feels like lift off."

"It frightens me that you know this."

He looked green to her. "This isn't my first trip to Vegas, Chuck."

"Which explains how you know how to get there with the lights off?"

"No, that's what the night vision goggles are for, so I can see, but no one sees us. The road retains the heat more than the sand, may as well be noon."

Chuck only knew where she was by her voice, not even the instrument lights were on. "To you."

"Would you rather it was you? We've only got the one pair."

"No! No, that's fine. You know what they say, what I don't know can kill me, but at least I won't see it coming."

"Who says that, Chuck?"

"I don't know, I saw it on a tombstone, so 'said' might be stretching a point…"

"Uh-oh."

"Sarah, these are not the kind of circumstances where a driver is allowed to say 'uh-oh'!"

Something lit up behind them.

"Uh-oh." He was the passenger, so he was allowed to say it.

"Chuck?"

"Yeah?"

She handed him her gun. "How good a shot are you?"

* * *

Carina sank into a chair without noticing. "You had to shoot someone?"

"Some_thing_. It was a police car of some kind, I think. Lots of flashy lights, and a searchlight that really made it hard for Sarah to see, and since we were going so fast that really wasn't a good thing."

"He was trying to get my plates, since I had those lights off too," added Sarah. "Once Chuck shot out his searchlight-with one shot, I might add," she said proudly, "I was able to outrun him easily."

Chuck smiled. "Well, not easily. This guy was pretty determined. I think shooting out his searchlight made him mad."

Carina wasn't impressed. "Marksmanship like that, under those conditions, should have made him _scared_, the dumbass."

* * *

"Aha! Here it is!"

Ellie looked up, saw the General watching another screen. "What's that, General?"

"We got an RFA that night, a request for assistance pursuing a vehicle close to state lines at high speed. It mentioned shots fired."

"What happened?"

Beckman smirked. "As the nearest Federal substation, the call was routed through Castle. Colonel Casey handled it, not as politely as Agent Miller just did."

"He killed it?"

"Of course not, Doctor. As a Federal Agent it's his duty to render assistance to state authorities upon request. Naturally he forwarded this on to the Nevada station. Eventually."

"Eventually?"

"Yes, it seems there was a…communications issue of some kind. By the time he resolved it and passed on the request, the Nevada substation determined that no meaningful action could be taken and took none."

"What was the issue?"

"It's not in the Nevada report. I'll have to check Casey's report. Probably it's buried in, I mean, located in some footnote or other."

* * *

"You haven't answered my question."

"Which question?"

"Your first check-in? You should have called in an hour, but unless you were doing two-fifty on winding mountain roads in the dark with the lights off–"

"The Terminator did it."

Carina held a hand to her ear. "Hello, is Chuck there? This is real life calling," she said.

Sarah fixed her with a look. As his wife, making fun of Chuck's nerdiness was _her_ job. "I told you it was a tiny border town."

"You also told me you'd never get married, so you'll pardon my lack of faith."

Sarah slammed her head down on her husband's chest, knocking the wind out of him. "Fine."

* * *

The 'Welcome to Nevada, the Silver State' sign was long since lost in the darkness behind them.

"I can't believe we made it," said Chuck.

"We haven't yet," said Sarah. "We only made it to Nevada, but unless we get married before they catch up to us we may as well have stayed in Burbank."

Chuck heard the change in the sound of the car's engine. "So what are you slowing down for? Let's not let them catch up to us!"

She sighed. "I have to stop for gas sometime, Chuck. And I have to check in with Casey, get a sit-rep. If he gives us the all-clear, we have to turn around."

"So we could still lose?"

"It was always a long shot. They only have to give out licenses from 8 AM to midnight, so unless we happen to meet both the county clerk and a wedding officiant at that gas station up there we still have a way to go."

"Can I see your phone?"

"No, you can't throw it out the window."

"_Why_ must you be so good, honest, and honorable, always doing the right thing?"

She lifted her hand to stroke his cheek. "I think we both know the answer to that." The car slid into place next to the pumps. "Here's your hat. Keep your face hidden while you fill up. I'll hit the bathrooms and (sigh) call Casey."

"Feel free to drop it in." She didn't dignify his wit with a response, so he did his part in feeding the machine.

In no time at all she was walking back to the car, smiling. "Chuck, I have terrible news."

Hope bloomed. "You…suddenly discovered you have epilepsy, and you dropped your phone in the outhouse during a seizure."

"Um…no."

Hope withered. "Then I give up."

"I have the wrong phone." She held up the device in her hand, with an American flag and a picture of Reagan on the screen.

The image froze his brain. "You what?"

"I have the wrong phone. In all the confusion dealing with those Ring Agents and getting our gear, I ended up with Casey's phone, and he probably has mine."

"What's so terrible about that? Just check in with Casey's phone."

"I can't do that, Chuck. If I use his phone, it'll look like he called me, which is a violation of protocol. The only thing we can do is wait until he realizes he's got my phone, and initiates the call himself, pretending to be me."

_Catch-22. _"That could be a while," said Chuck thoughtfully. "Casey's awfully honest, and not very clever about such things. Duplicity just isn't in his nature."

"That's so true." She sighed. "Well, nothing to do except keep moving forward."

"If we must." Suddenly Chuck smiled. "Can I drive?"

"No," she said firmly. "But I'll let you upgrade the playlist on this phone if you like."

He took it from her hand. "Deal." He got back into the car much faster than he'd gotten out of it.

The red Porsche screamed through the Nevada night, this time with joy.

* * *

**A/N2 **Viva Las Vegas!


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N **We now continue with last episode's flashback.

* * *

"_Chuck, what were you thinking?" _

"_Orion gave me his wrist computer before we left." _

"_It frightens me that you know this__."_

"_Duplicity just isn't in his nature." _

* * *

They pulled off at a scenic overlook in the mountains, the lights of Las Vegas glowing in the blackness of the desert surrounding it. "Almost there," said Sarah.

"Las Vegas spaceport," said Chuck. "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy."

"Don't be silly, Chuck," said Sarah. "There's lots more hives of scum and villainy more wretched than this one."

"No, Sarah, you're supposed to say-you know what, just forget it." He tapped her binoculars. "Can you really see anything through those?"

She took them away from her face and rubbed her nose. "Of course I can. You know all those blobs of light you see down there?"

"Yes?"

She put them back up to her eyes. "Well, with these they're little individual specks of light."

"But are they evil Ring specks of light? That's the question."

"You think I can tell the difference between organized crime specks of light, and evil Ring specks of light at _this_ distance?"

Shooting it out with the Ring while dodging Mafiosi. "Suddenly I'm rethinking my father's clever plan."

"Don't be such a baby, Chuck. We follow orders, and we stay within mission parameters. As long as we stay away from the clerk's office we should be perfectly safe."

"Uh, Sarah, sweetie, I hate to break this to you but we need to get a license first."

"I know that, Chuck, but from the clerk. It doesn't say anything about the clerk's office, which is good, because that's the first place I'd stake out if I were laying a trap for me."

"But where are you gonna find a clerk at this—oh no, Sarah! You can't _do_ that!"

* * *

"Can't do what?" asked Carina, already guessing the answer.

* * *

"Can't do what?" asked Ellie, completely bewildered.

"Find out where the clerk lives, or clerks, I suppose, and ambush one of them in his own home." General Beckman shrugged in the face of Ellie's astonishment. "It's what _I_ would have done."

* * *

Carina burst out laughing. "You kidnapped a county clerk to get a marriage license?"

"We didn't kidnap him," said Sarah, her voice muffled.

Chuck raised her head, lifting her face from where she'd buried it against his chest. "Sweetie, you broke into his house, woke him up, and forced him up out of his own bed at badgepoint—"

"He was a loyal American citizen! He was happy to help out a Federal Agent in the performance of her duties!"

He silenced her lips with his. "And a good thing that was true, too, or we'd've had quite the gun battle on our hands trying to drop the thing off afterward."

"I said I was sorry!"

"Sooo not the point."

She pouted. "It made sense at the time."

He grinned, running a finger over her lips. "If this is your idea of a proper response to sudden marriage-related crises, I going to have to keep more careful track of our anniversary."

"I can see it now," said Carina. "Sarah running along the tarmac, throwing her badge at the cockpit. 'Federal Agent!'" She waved her hands in the air hysterically.

Sarah turned her head, stuck out her tongue, and flopped down on her husband's chest again. They both let out simultaneous '_Hmmp!_'s as Carina laughed at them.

* * *

"She's awfully mouthy for someone just off of Death Row."

Beckman sniffed. "You don't know Carina very well, do you?"

* * *

"On the other hand," said Chuck, "It's not as if he didn't get his revenge."

Sarah pulled the blankets over her head.

Carina leaned in _reeaall_ close.

* * *

Sarah stood on the sidewalk, in shock. He'd seemed like such a nice man. _"The Oceans of Elvises Chapel of Love?"_

* * *

Chuck waited patiently for the laughter to cease, the writhing on the floor to end, the coughing to stop, and the hand that reached up shakily to grab the railing of his bed. Carina dragged herself up, red-faced, and whimpered, "The what?"

Chuck patted the blanket-covered, shivering lump on his chest, and grinned at her with hideous glee. "She missed most of the joy of it! It was Oceans _o'_ Elvises and Chapel _o'_ Love_._ The Os weren't even Os, they were little Mars and Venus symbols, interlinked. And 'love' was spelled L-U-V. And that was just the sign! It had to be the cheesiest, tackiest, most tawdry excuse for a chapel in a city famous for sleaze. It was beautiful, like a train wreck frozen at just the perfect moment! I saw it and just…fell in love, we had to go in."

"I told you I'd kill you," came Sarah's muffled voice.

"You said you'd kill me if I told anyone," Chuck said to the lump.

"Which you just did!"

"I can see why you told everyone it was a small border town," said Carina, patting the lump's head. "I was all set to go out and find out which one, in case I need to get married again."

"See? The secret would have been out soon anyway," said Chuck."And it's not even like we used our real names."

Carina looked up in shock. "You didn't?"

The blanket flapped down. "Of course we did," snapped Sarah. "On the license. But I think the only person who actually read the license was the clerk, and I think he was the clerk because he was the only one who could _read_."

Chuck leaned his head back against the pillow. "Oh, God, that clerk. Where the hell did he get that accent?"

"Texas, I thought."

"Certainly big enough."

Suddenly Sarah draped herself over him. "_We do ever'thang big, in Texas_."

Carina blinked. "What the hell kind of an accent is that?"

Sarah turned her head and snapped, "_What the hell are y'all doin' in mah room? Mah husband is gonna kick y'all's behind!" _She looked up at Chuck, batting her eyes._ "Show her, Charlie baby._"

Carina looked at Chuck too, not batting her eyes because, hey, once you get off Death Row is no reason to go back on. "And they had this guy at the front desk, Charlie baby?"

Chuck closed his eyes. "She was like that all the way up to the ceremony…"

Sarah drooped. "Only way I could walk through the door. I never needed to be a different person so much in my life."

Carina recalled the reigning champion. "Not even during that wet T-shirt contest?"

"Tequila's a false identity all its own." Still, Sarah shuddered in hazy memory. "I had to go through this cold sober, God help me, so Sarah Walker, Southern dingbat, got married in my place."

"To Charlie-baby Bartowski?" She couldn't see that one flying under anyone's radar.

Chuck sat bolt upright. "_Hell, no_," he said, oozing Southern…something. "_Mah name is Charles Charles and this here is Mrs. Charles and we are the Charleses._"

"_The Charleseses_," echoed Sarah, sounding six drinks in.

Carina sat back. "No wonder they didn't read the license."

"Would you?"

"I'd be looking for a camera. I'm shocked this isn't up on youtube."

Chuck leered at Sarah. "_What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, ain't that right, baby?_"

Carina held up a hand in protest, or supplication. "Please don't do that anymore."

Chuck and Sarah sank back down onto the bed, appallingly comfortable.

Carina looked up when she thought it was safe, found them looking at her. "Was everyone like that?"

"Nah. They were Elvis impersonators from all over."

"Even the bridesmaid?" That was _her_ job!

Sarah shook her head. "Nope. He was Priscilla impersonator."

"I think the vows were lyrics from 'Love Me Tender.'"

"You don't know?"

_He took his place in front of the officiant, guided along by the steady hand of someone used to guiding dumbstruck grooms along. _

_He was here. She was here. _

_She stood in front of him in a black combat suit, wearing a plastic tiara with a veil and holding a sprig of plastic flowers in her hand. God she was beautiful. _

_She smiled at him, for him, and the sun rose._

"_Will you, Charles…" The man kept talking, but somewhere between his lips and Chuck's ears it all turned into the beat of his heart, the sound of his breath. Love conquered all other sensations. _

_Lub. Dub._

_Lub. Dub._

_Until the officiant coughed and the best man gave him a gentle nudge. They were used to that, too._

"_I will," he said, forgetting the accent. "Today, tomorrow, and forever."_

"_Amen," said the best man, wiping the tears from his eyes. "Great song."_

"Yo, Chuck! You in there?" prompted Carina.

Chuck shook off the pleasantly hazy memory. "I have no idea."

"I hope you mean about the lyrics," said carina, eyeing him dubiously. "Sarah?"

_She kept her cover intact, playing the ditzy blonde until her 'bridesmaid' put the tiara in her hair, draping the veil across her face. A mask in front of a mask. __Too many masks. She was stifling under the weight of them._

'_Priscilla' put a piece of plastic in her hands and her fingers closed around it as she stepped out in front of the officiant._

_Chuck._

_She was there. He was there. It was all real._

_The veil was real. No need for masks, or desire. They all came tumbling down, behind the impervious shield of that veil. She could be herself in his eyes, whoever that happened to be. So long since she'd been that person._

"_Today, tomorrow, and forever."_

_Her soul rang like a bell. She missed everything the officiant said. Every word. "I will. I do," she said, when she realized no one was talking. "Yes."_

_Then the veil was gone, and the husband was kissing the bride. Mission accomplished._

_Now what?_

"Hello! Earth to Sarah!"

_What now? _Sarah came out of her trance. "Huh?"

Carina rolled her eyes. "You got a live one there, tiger."

"You have no idea," said Chuck, and Carina–_Carina!_–blushed.

* * *

_And here I thought the sprinklers going off was the worst wedding day of all time._ Ellie looked around. "Is it just me or is it hot in here?" She really, _really_ wished Carina would get the hell out of there so she could release her patient. She really, _really_ needed to get home to her doctor.

* * *

"So where'd you honeymoon, Graceland?"

"It…was a hotel room…"

"With room service," added Sarah. "Lots of room service."

"We each only had the one set of clothes, we had to save them for the trip back." _That's our story and we're sticking to it._

Carina smirked at the pair of them. "Which you did by not wearing anything at all, for three days. Did you guys manage to see any part of Las Vegas at all? By daylight?"

Sarah shook her head. "Remember, we had to lay low." Which this was, for Vegas.

"You had to lay—" Carina stopped, clenching her fists in her lap. "Nope. Not gonna do it."

"On the third day the room service guy told me they had a dining room in the hotel, but then Casey called and we had to come back," said Chuck mildly.

"Just like that?"

Sarah frowned. "What are you implying?"

* * *

He eyed her dishevelment-the flushed cheeks, the hair-uncertainly. "You okay, Boss?"

He was so considerate. "I'm fine, Manoosh. My sides are sore, that's all. Sometimes something happens that makes this whole stupid job worth it, and we were listening in."

He loved his job. "We?"

The monitor was dark, Beckman disconnected when the door first started cycling open. At least, that was her excuse. "North Star and I."

"Oh." Above his pay grade. "I was looking at those records you asked me about…?"

"What? Oh, that." She waved a hand in dismissal. "You can forget that, I was just blind-sided by the General and had a panic moment. I think I have all the records already."

"Most of them, it seems." He could have hacked her private files and made sure, but he wasn't about to take that risk. Only the Piranha could have done that undetected, and he wasn't the Piranha. Sometimes he wondered if anyone was. "But I found a reference in these interviews you did, to a Mr. Colt?"

Ellie nodded. "Charles Carmichael's first appearance. Unrecorded, since they were planning to murder the Host and that's not something you want to have on disk when the trial starts."

He shook his head. She was so innocent. _Like there would ever be a trial. _"You know we can get that back anyway, right?"

* * *

Morgan Grimes got out of the car when the Secret Service agent opened the door for him. "Your agenda for tomorrow, sir."

He took the paper automatically. "Thank you."

"We'll come for you at ten. Be ready."

"I will." The agent got back in the car and Morgan, being Morgan, waved goodbye to men who wouldn't respond if their mothers waved goodbye. As he walked up to the front door he studied the list of events laid out in fifteen-minute increments. Who could live like this?

He pushed up on the knob so the door wouldn't squeak as he opened it, and tiptoed past Mrs. P's office door. Even with the Secret Service backing him up she still wasn't too happy about him skipping out on breakfast duty. Avoiding the creaky steps, he went up to his room on the next floor. He slipped inside and grabbed the towel nearby, laying against the door so no light would show. Only then did he flip the switch. "Gah!"

"Hi Morgan," said Alex quietly. "Can I talk to you for a minute?"

"Sure," he puffed out. He checked his own pulse. "I've heard heart attacks can take quite a while to kill you, so you might want to talk fast, though."

She walked up to him and put her hand on his. "I need to tell you about my father."

* * *

**A/N2 **The Honeymoon is over!


End file.
